- Can there be some tutorials/quidelines on how to use best lots of instances with GI ? I would like to use Light Cache because that way the final render pass is the fastest, but you need huge amounts of RAM on each rendernode when trying to render millions of instances in an animation.- Where/when will we be notified IF there is an update available. Current verion I have is 2.04 beta !- When doing grass, hedges or carpets even millions of instances may not be enough, but surely drains your system resources. Would it not be possible to optimize these situations (huge of amounts of low poly objects) by clustering these small objects in the background to larger proxies ?- When making hedges covered with small leaves, I wonder if instances on the backside of the base object are loaded into memory. If not, would it be possible to not load unseen instances ? Not only outisde the camera view, but also unseen!!- If this is possible, would it also be possible to set a flag, not rendering unseen instances, even if they are seen in reflections/refractions ?- I bought 2 licenses for 2 machines on different locations, while I am a single user...so these machines will never be used at the same time. Although I understand that you need to protect your software, I really would like to see a more relaxed attitude towards users that have extraordinary circumstances. I really have a lot of plugins (even some you are selling for other parties) where I am allowed to use them on 2 machines. Even with Max under subscription !!!

LC isn't good idea for huge amount of proxies. Use Irr Map + BF, BF + BF, or Light Dome and BF + none. The last one is much fastest for me. It means, that you can use just Light Dome and BF as primary and none as secondary GI.

2.04 beta is lastest version at this moment. You well be notified when a new one will be available.

@Karba: Thanks for all info. Allowing users to work on both work/home or work/laptop has nothing to do with protection but with policy. For example: GrowFX has some same sort of protection mechanisme but you are allowed to activate twice, as written on their purchase page http://www.exlevel.com/purchase

trick wrote: Allowing users to work on both work/home or work/laptop has nothing to do with protection but with policy. For example: GrowFX has some same sort of protection mechanisme but you are allowed to activate twice, as written on their purchase page http://www.exlevel.com/purchase

Ok, we will think about it. Last time everybody wants to have free rendernodes and we have done it.

@Duche: It is really good that you did free rendernodes. Even if that would make the plugin somewhat more expensive. It's not only about cost: it's not fun anymore to install my complete setup on a new machine and have all the licenses transfered, re-authorised, etc. Last time I did this, my new machine stood at least one month next to my old one before I could fully use it. And if you work from 2 locations and don't want a too big speed difference, you need to update 2 machine together. I also use Lightwave and FormZ which are dongle-protected, and with it all the plugins are attached to these dongles too. Both softwares even do not require you to install: you just copy the directories to the new machine and there you go !!

With vrayscatter you can just copy vrayscatter.dlo to 3dsmax\plugins\vrayplugins folder. For rendernodes you can make installation of vray to one network directory and add it to plugins.ini and also put in this vrayplugins folder vrayscatter.dlo file (be carefull vrayscatter.dlo for workstation and for rendernodes is different). All rendernodes will take all plugins from one place - ins very simple way to add or remove plugins for any number of computers.